Fantastic Literature at the Beginning of the Third Millennium: Terror, Religion, and the Hogwarts Syndrome.

Danielle Gurevitch

Abstract

The seven books in the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling, published consecutively over a nine-year period, have achieved unprecedented commercial success. Given the heterogeneity of Harry Potter enthusiasts, it seems as if the whole world has been captivated by the charm of the bespectacled wizard. This article suggests that Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Sorcery trains its students to be leaders, equipping them with the necessary skills by means of pedagogical methods that reflect contemporary, non-magical, progressive Western education systems. For the construction of her plots, Rowling draws on a universal, value-oriented symbolic language (reason and ethics) associated with the cultural codes of New Spiritualism.